The Best Thing That Can Happen to a Croissant

by Pablo Tusset

  ‘All you do is talk shit.’

  ‘Fine, okay. But for once in your life, why don’t you listen to my shit, because this time I’m not going to repeat it. I am not interested in your world, or the people in it. Every so often I may grow fond of someone, but almost inevitably it’s like the kind of fondness you feel for sea turtles: you can watch them frolic in the sun from the terrace but you never feel they’re really with you. Do you know what I mean? I don’t need anyone – you do. You need an audience that admires you, little mirrors that reflect that various facets of your grandeur: wife, children, lover, parents, friends, clients, employees, first-class plane tickets, awards, playing Debussy, driving your Lotus, being able to satisfy women sexually. I don’t, and do you know why? Because in the majority of cases, admiration is nothing more than a veiled form of envy, and I don’t want people to envy me: it makes me sick, it makes me embarrassed, it grosses me out. Get it? And there’s something else I’m going to tell you: yes, it is entirely possible that for a while I was sick – sick from loneliness, like a poor little ugly duckling, or else like a fully-erect, smooth-cheeked Neanderthal in a world of Cro-Magnons. I was so sick that I actually travelled around the world trying to find other swans like me. And you know what I found out? There are no swans – oh, maybe one or two for every hundred ducks, and that’s as true here as it is in Jakarta. It wasn’t easy for me to accept but eventually I got used to the idea. Ever since then I have simply preferred to isolate myself from that world that you all have so poorly created. What do you suggest I do? Replace my beer with a gym membership? Trade in the Metaphysical Club for a sports car? Give up hookers and get myself a wife who sees me as nothing more than a sperm bank and then compensate with a lover who sucks me off now and then? No thanks. I am who I am, I enjoy life in my own way and that is a hell of a lot more than most people can say for themselves.’

  My vehemence appeared to have mesmerised The First, who was not used to hearing me speak in that tone of voice. Had I actually spoken my mind? Had I been totally honest with my Magnificent Brother for once in my life? Tough to say: the things we consider to be truths are usually just more lies, only with better spin on them. Let’s just say that I said what I felt was appropriate to say to The First at that moment, and I kept at it for a while until I got the sense that he was beginning to understand me somewhat.

  When I finished up my little speech, The First had a very serious expression on his face. He pulled out one of the chairs and sat down, resting his arms on the table. He sat there, silent, for about a minute, staring at his intertwined thumbs. I walked around the table and sat down in front of him, in the same position, letting the silence take effect.

  ‘Are you sure?’ he asked at last, raising his eyes to meet mine.

  ‘Well, I’ve been trying to tell you that for a while.’

  ‘All right. But do me one favour.’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘I am going to propose a modification to the agreement with Ignacio. A year from now, I want us to be able to meet and have a chat alone, just the two of us. And if at that point you’ve changed your mind, he will have to let me take your place for a year.’

  ‘Real Bugs Bunny, your idea.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Forget it … all right. If he accepts, so do I.’

  ‘What are we going to tell your girlfriend?’ he asked.

  ‘Well, for the moment, that we’ve been kidnapped, that they’ve demanded a ransom and that Dad has paid up. I suppose the Exorcist will agree to go along with that one. And when I don’t leave here with the two of you, just tell her that I have to stay until Dad pays the second half of the ransom. Then I’ll write her a conveniently stamped postcard saying that I’ve left town in search of whatever sounds good. She doesn’t know me well enough to see through it, even though she would tell you differently.’

  ‘And Mom and Dad?’

  ‘For now, we’ll tell Mom that you’ve sent me to Bilbao to investigate.’

  ‘Bilbao?’

  ‘She thinks you’re in Bilbao.’

  ‘Oh, really. And what, may I ask, am I doing in Bilbao?’

  ‘It’d take too long to explain it all. Now, the person we’re going to have a tougher time with is Dad. He’s been tailing me for days. But if you do the talking he’ll believe anything you can dish up, short of Martians. As far as your wife, you’re on your own because I don’t even know how much of this she was in on. Speaking of which: sort of odd that your wife and your secretary have the same second last name.’

  ‘I already told you, don’t be too hard on Gloria.’

  ‘She sure has talent, I’ll say that for her. We hired a private eye and she actually pretended to be the sister of someone who was, in fact, her sister … Another thing, and forgive me for being dense but I’ve always had a hell of a time following these plots. Now: if your secretary is, in addition to your wife’s half-sister, the daughter of the big boss around here, why did they kidnap her with you?’

  ‘They didn’t kidnap her: she just went out of circulation when I did, in case the police were to suddenly get involved. That turned the case into a simple lovers’ tryst.’

  ‘But Gloria knew about it …’

  ‘Lali is her sister. Gloria never knew her father. Ignacio raised her when her mother died.’

  ‘Jesus, this is like an Almodóvar movie. But wait – I had dinner with your wife at the Vellocino and I didn’t perceive the slightest hint of a paterno–filial relationship between her and Ignacio.’

  ‘They must have taken care not to let on.’

  ‘Right. But even so, you’re still her husband and, as mental as it sounds, I would even say she loves you …’

  ‘That was why she tried to lead them to the person they were really after. She knew they’d get to you sooner or later and wanted to save me the trouble of refusing to confess your name.’

  ‘And Dad … why in the hell did they hit him?’

  ‘To put the pressure on me. But they realised pretty quickly that he is not a man to be messed with.’

  ‘Why didn’t they leave you alone, then, when they found out that I was the one sniffing around Jaume Guillamet? They’ve known for days, or it seems so at least.’

  ‘Because I was very careful to give them a bunch of false leads. And I did such a good job of it that when they found you nosing about they figured you might not be the only one doing so and that, in addition to my brother, I was protecting someone else. I imagine they began to suspect Josephine, too. And it was very easy to stick her in a car and bring her here.’

  ‘I’m starting to get dizzy …’

  ‘All right then, leave it for now and let’s get back to details. We also have to decide what we’re going to tell Beba.’

  ‘I told her you were in jail in Bilbao, too, so it won’t be too hard to make the version I told her jibe with Mom’s.’

  ‘You told Beba I was in jail? You did that?’

  ‘Shit, Sebastian. I’d like to see you try and invent some of the snow jobs I had to come up with to justify the insanity that was going on.’

  ‘Well, for an expert in snow jobs, this one is pretty fucking lame. If you didn’t drink so much, maybe you’d be a better liar …’

  ‘The only reason you think it’s lame is because you’re a fucking spoiled brat, that’s why, kid.’

  ‘You call me kid once more and I’m going to throw that ashtray in your face. And do me the favour of focusing on what we have to focus on and not getting carried away with your bullshit.’

  Anyway. That was the beginning of what would be a very long night, despite the date. I guess you can imagine the rest. But that was pretty much it: the game was up.

  EPILOGUE

  Everyone knows that the end of one story is merely the beginning of another, very different story.

  Today is June 23rd, exactly one year from the days I have described in all these pages. That is, today I am supposed to meet with my Magnificent Brother, although we finall
y struck an agreement with Ignacio that is far more favourable for me: tonight I have permission to leave and visit the outside world while The First takes my place here. I will have to return before dawn tomorrow, Cinderella style, but I don’t need much more than that. One does end up missing those sea turtles, and even I feel the need to stop in at Luigi’s bar to get good and wasted, even though I know that tomorrow I will have to come back here.

  I still read all my email from the Metaphysical Club and now I have more time than ever to read John’s sentences. For the past two months, in fact, we’ve even had a couple of interns working for us. High philosophy has always been something of a parlour game for idle aristocrats, a delicacy and an indulgence if I may say so myself, and in that sense this the ideal place to occupy myself with being and nothingness – it’s even better than the university department where John sleeps off his hangovers, because I don’t have to bother myself discussing Heidegger with a bunch of acne-ridden snotnoses. I’ve actually spent the better part of this past year working on a kind of update of The Stronghold that Ignacio is very concerned about. I’m not sure exactly how I ended up being their scribe but that is how things have turned out. Apparently the Worm World Council has been trying for some time to come up with a document that retains the spirit of the old Stronghold without being so scandalously obvious as the original, and Ignacio seems to think that I am the most appropriate person to draft such a document. I don’t know … he’s got this idea that I’m some kind of reincarnation of Geoffrey de Brun – he says it jokingly, but sometimes I catch a glimmer in his eyes that sends a shiver down my spine. Aside from the fact that I’m not particularly interested in being the reincarnation of anyone, I also tried to convince him that writing isn’t really my thing, but he insisted so vehemently that I finally warmed up to it. And so we finally sent the definitive version about fifteen days ago and the Council gave it the thumbs-up. I imagine the Metaphysical guys will like it.

  Fina, for the record, receives regular postcards from Devil’s Lake, South Dakota, where I supposedly teach Spanish to American students and live with that whore who seduced me and to whom I attributed US nationality. In the first letters I received from her – very long, invariably sheathed by a scented, lilac-coloured envelope that matched the paper – she strung me up by the balls. But from what I can tell from her most recent missive – oddly, much shorter and in a sky-blue envelope this time – it seems that good old José María has gotten down to business with her, so much so that they’re going to have a couple of human pups. Would Fina know how to do something so complicated? I have prayed to Our Lady of Microsoft so that she doesn’t muck anything up in the DNA replication process and I trust that some genetic specialist from the Social Security Office will explain to her – slowly – exactly what it is she has to do. In any event, I doubt she misses me very much. If there’s one thing I know, it’s that women are capable of demanding every last bit of attention that one is capable of giving them, but the majority of them undergo a radical change as soon as they achieve their reproductive objective. Give them a couple of pups and they can’t be bothered with anything else for years. And the same is true of the husbands, too.

  Of course, my family also believes that I am somewhere in Yankee land, we didn’t want to go around making up incompatible stories, after all. For my Father’s Highness we invented a five-hundred-thousand-euro ransom for his Magnificent Son (we didn’t want to get abusive), though I suspect that The First, crafty soul that he is, figured out some way to pocket the cash in the process. No doubt he’ll put the money toward a vat of expensive cologne – those little bottles they sell in the department store don’t last a minute. I talk to my Father’s Highness on the phone every so often and, naturally, the only thing that interests him is my supposed American girlfriend. Beba, on the other hand, smelled a bit of a rat, and made me tell her all about my apartment, the food I eat, and the language academy I work for, so that she could be sure it wasn’t some kind of hellhole like in that Sidney Poitier movie. Not to mention the endless speech I had to give her to explain that a person would actually pay me to teach something as easy as Spanish.

  As far as everything else, I’m having a pretty good time here. I mean, I can get trashed whenever I want in Jenny G’s penthouse and eat at the Vellocino, to cite two establishments the reader is familiar with. And if one wishes to maintain contact with externals, one can play football with guys that charge an arm and a leg to play on a day other than Sunday, and I can even attend training sessions with a Dutch trainer who stopped smoking some time ago. But if you’re not into sports, you can hang out with a certain someone who does interviews on TV and another one that plays a cop, and other assorted hotshots you would definitely recognise if you saw them.

  But there’s more: can you guess who plays the piano as all my evenings come to a close? Well, actually, we use the piano very infrequently – in the long run you end up getting sore from tickling the ivories so much. The worst thing is that lately she won’t stop talking about pups – she may be a bohemian, but she is getting on in years, after all. Given, however, that I still find viviparous reproduction to be so retrograde, I adamantly refuse to abandon the cult of latex. That little fox sure knows how to make things difficult for me, though, so who knows? Any day something could go wrong and we’ll end up in some kind of mutual mess. I wouldn’t put it past us.

  Of course, the majority of this brigade that wafts in and out of here only knows part of the whole story about what goes on inside this place – I am an internal, of course, and am always here, just like the rest of the so-called ‘natives’ and so these pages I have been writing on the sly are no doubt fuelled by the bit of homesickness that still plagues me. That’s why I’m glad to be able to leave for a night, even if it’s only for one night a year – precisely that night when the most colourful of externals come to celebrate the summer solstice inside this place. Ever since last night at midnight they’ve been filing in with that little red rag always fluttering in the wind. Sometimes it’s hard for me to accept the fact that the outside world still exists, right there behind the walls that encircle the ground floor of our enclave. And I have to stick my head out on the terrace to hear the sound of firecrackers to remind myself that I am still, in fact, in Barcelona. Naturally I understand that I ought to explain what I mean by such terms as ‘natives’ and ‘internals’ and all that other stuff, but The First had a point about something: The Fortress has a way of awakening curiosity in people, and that curiosity is, in fact, the greatest source of danger to people on the outside who venture near here. The more you know, the more you want to know and it’s none too wise to go sniffing around – you already know what kind of mess you can get into if you start down that road.

  My body and soul are crying out to celebrate the San Juan holiday, and so I will only take another minute to finish explaining that, of course, everything I’ve written here is completely false. That is to say, true – ‘Give a man a mask and he will tell you the truth,’ as they say. And for that reason, tonight I will surreptitiously leave here with a diskette containing this text. Despite the care I have taken to change names and places, I know that if I ask Ignacio’s permission he will simply say no. So I won’t tell him anything. And as far as my readers are concerned: what’s the difference if Fina’s name isn’t really Fina, she’s still the same naive girl. And what’s the difference if my Magnificent Brother’s car is a Maserati instead of a Lotus, or my Magnificent Brother is, in reality, a Magnificent Sister, or if my name is John and not Pablo or if, in fact, I am the same Lady First who appeared in these pages and who finally gave up the bottle and managed to transcribe the insane story that her husband Sebastian and her good-fornothing brother-in-law got mixed up in.

  Still, now that I think about it, lately I’ve been getting the feeling that Ignacio has something up his sleeve: at times I’ve even thought that maybe he is the one writing these words. And in that case it would have been an unforgivable gaffe to have suppl
anted the persona of the president of the Worm World Council for so many pages: the great Pablo Miralles, worthy successor to Geoffrey de Brun.

  In any event, everyone knows what a hell of a time I have understanding movie plots, so just in case I got side-tracked and something isn’t totally clear, I will be glad to respond to questions directed to pablomiralles@hotmail.com.

  I read my email every day.